Blog Post 1, Assessment

I've always thought of assessment as a really hard thing to manage for my area of teaching - choir. In the past, all of my choir classes do grading based off of attendance. In fact, at Jacobs, that's how they grade choir: every absence lowers your grade by a letter grade, therefore if you go to all of the rehearsals, you get an A. The main reason it's difficult to grade is because it's hard to grade different students because it's so talent based. Also, if you grade on effort rather than talent, it's hard to distinguish what students are working hard and what students aren't working hard, but are just naturally better musicians. How can I manage this in my classroom? Does anyone have any ideas?

*I'm answering the third bullet point here, so the chart can be last!*

You cannot look at an assessment and know whether or not it's formative or summative because it's based off of what the teacher does with the material, not what the material is. A test can be used as formative assessment, and a spontaneous activity can be used as summative! Formative assessment is all about the teacher and the student determining progress and making adjustments so that they understand the material. Summative, on the other hand, is kind of like a "final evaluation" of what the student has learned, which is used often for grades or to see how the teacher's methods of instruction have worked. Therefore, you can't just look at an assessment and assume it's formative or summative: it's all about how the teacher analyzes and uses that assessment.

	FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT	SUMMATIVE ASSESSMENT
FORMALLY ASSESSED	This means the assessment is pre-planned and helps to discover what the students have learned, and helps the teacher and student determine progress and make adjustments while still in progress. An example could be an in-class assignment. This could be announced beforehand ("we're going to have an assignment on this section next week during class"), but the teacher could walk around and help students, so that they were both adjusting and determining the progress of learning on the material.	This means the assessment is pre-planned and helps to discover what the students have learned, and helps the teacher evaluate progress at the end of a unit. This could be the standard final exam given at the end of the semester - it's pre-planned, and it gives the teacher a tool to evaluate the effectiveness of his or her instruction as well as the student's understanding of the material.
INFORMALLY ASSESSED	This means the assessment is a spontaneous observation of how students perform in class, and helps both the teacher and the student determine progress and make adjustments while still in progress. An example could be having students do some group discussions. The teacher could walk around and observe how well students understand the material, and can help them and discuss with them in an informal setting so they can adjust if necessary.	This means the assessment is a spontaneous observation of how students perform in class, and helps the teacher evaluate progress at the end of a unit. An example in a choir class could be listening to each student sing in the choir during one of the last days of classes (not announced, and just casually, without having them sing by themselves) to assess their improvement over the semester. It would be spontaneous, and the teacher would be able to gather information that would help them assess how much they've accomplished over the semester.